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Noelle Pikus-Pace leads strong U.S. Olympic skeleton team

Noelle Pikus-Pace, Katie Uhlaender, Matt Antoine, John Daly and Kyle Tress were named to the USA's Olympic skeleton team on Saturday. They head into the Sochi Olympics in February with a strong chance to medal

"We've had a motto this year and that's not to be perfect but to be fast," U.S. coach Tuffy Latour said. "The other thing we've really been focusing on is one corner at a time and let the results happen for themselves. That's what we're going to do at the Olympics. Take it one corner at a time and have fun."

Pikus-Pace, who is second in the World Cup standings with one race left before Sochi, has been on the podium in six of seven races — three golds, two silvers and a bronze — and won the seventh race but was disqualified for a sled violation in the post-race inspection.

Britain's Elizabeth Yarnold, who has been on the podium in every race — remains her main competition for gold, but Austria's Janine Flock, Britain's Shelley Rudman, Germany's Anja Huber and — because of the home-track advantage — Russia's Maria Orlova and Elena Nikitina are also medal contenders.

Antoine, who just missed making the 2010 Vancouver Olympic team, is fourth in the World Cup standings and has been on the podium in three of the seven races, including a gold-medal finish in Lake Placid. Antoine remains a medal contender but faces strong competition from Latvia's Martins Dukurs and Tomass Dukurs, Russia's Alexander Tretiakov and Canada's John Fairbairn.

There weren't any true surprises, though Tress finished 22nd in the first World Cup race of the season in Calgary and had work to do from that point. He worked his way to 11th in the overall standings with a strong second half that included two top-10 finishes in Europe.

"I was concerned about making the team right after Calgary," Tress said. "I was so disappointed. But I knew at that moment I had to make a decision. I could either worry about that and let that be the driving factor for the rest of the season or move ahead.

"One of the things we've been talking about as a team since Tuffy has come aboard is that you have to focus on the process. You can't be worried about results."